Forgive Me

I've done a bad/awesome thing.  I've made ice cream.  But not just any ice cream....

 
This ice cream doesn't mess around.  It's not trying to be something it's not.  It is straight up baller and knows it.  It doesn't even need to be turned into a milkshake to bring the boys to the yard.  Lil Wayne would rap about this ice cream.

Ok enough.  I'm ridiculous.  BUT. GET. THIS.

Cookie Dough flavored ice cream (no dough involved) + NUTELLA + Crunchy Cocoa Cinnamon Granola! 

Please re-read.  If you aren't on the same page as me on this, no need to read beyond this point. 

Here's what happens.  You make granola, and coat it in cocoa, cinnamon, and all the good things in the world, i.e. butter, maple syrup, and honey.  After you cook it, you let it cool.  Then you toss in some chocolate chips.

You make a custard base with brown butter and brown sugar for flavor.  You chill it.  Then you throw it in the ice cream maker.   When it's almost frozen, you sprinkle it with your granola and drizzle it with (large) scoopfuls of nutella. 

You eat it immediately and you do a dance with your hands because it is so good.  You are almost mad that you haven't made this before and almost mad that you will have this in your recipe book from here on out.  Forgive me on not letting you live before this date.  Forgive me for the massive amount of ice cream in your future.

Emotional Baking

I've come to realize I am an emotional baker.  Not like, I am a baker, and I am emotional (like my boyfriend pointed out much to my chagrin).  I mean that when I'm in heightened emotional states, my therapy is to bake.  See examples below.

When I'm frustrated with my job, I make pizza concotions. 

This one was brussels sprouts, bacon, and carmelized onions.  Then I do my best to not let us eat it all in one sitting.  Then I fail. 

 

When I'm trying to show my love, I make pie.  Either it's an "I'm in the Doghouse" pie.  Or, a "Hey, We All Love Each Other and Let's Eat Pie Together" pie.  Add tea.

Recently, it was a "Sometime's I'm a Dipshit" Banana Cream Pie with a fudgy "I'm Sorry" Ganache.  It turned into a "Let's Eat this for Every Meal" Pie.   I threw in some mini peanut butter cream tarts for good measure. 

When I'm angry, bread is the best medicine.  Kneading is therapeutic.  Really.  When angry tears come, all I want to do is knead the crap out of some dough.  Solution: Pretzels.

You can't go wrong.  You get to knead out your problems.  Then you when you are more composed you get to reflect for an hour while your dough rises (perhaps with a cocktail).  Then you get to focus on something else, like rolling and shaping them into perfect, twisted, salty morsels. 

And when I'm homesick and starting to get burned out from working two jobs, I make my mom's chex mix.

Then I eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  And snack.  And dessert?
Turns out, baking and cooking are how I relieve stress and sometimes how I express my feelings.  I'd have to say turning my frustration into creating something in the kitchen is a pretty healthy way for me to handle everything.  Although the heightened carb intake that comes after this therapeutic creating is likely not so healthy in the long run.  Such is life!

Want some recipes??
For the pizza, similar is here from Tracy at shutterbean.com.
For the pie, I adapted mine from the Williams Sonoma book Home Baked Comfort.  I'll post this later.
Pretzels. YUM!
Chex Mix is as follows!

16 cups of your favorite chex (I did 5 cups wheat, 5 cups rice, 6 cups corn)
2 cups pretzels (If my sister had her choice, she would omit these.  I use about 1.5 cups)
2 cups peanuts (I omit these because I don't like them much)
1 stick of butter
3 tsp Lawry's Seasoned Salt
7 tsp Worcestershire Sauce

Preheat your oven to 250 degrees.    Stick your butter on the pan you are cooking in and stick it in the oven as it is warming until it melts.  Pull out your pan, add the seasoned salt and worcestershire, and stir.  Add all of your chex.  Toss to coat.  Throw the pan in the oven for an hour, rotating chex every 15 minutes.  Add pretzels and peanuts after a half an hour. Let cool and try to keep your paws off of them!  I usually eat them while they are hot because I can't resist.

Dos and Don'ts of Champagne Brunch

I take champagne brunch seriously.  I don't schedule anything else for the rest of the day, because I know I will likely want to take a nap post champagne campaign.  I've been getting better at handling myself in an all you can drink champagne brunch.  My first time I may or may not have ended up hugging the toilet.  Graphic, I know,  but I've progressed, at least a little.

Here are some Dos and Don'ts that I've learned along the way:

DO hydrate the day before and during the hours before.  It'll make things better later.
DON'T take shots after. ARE YOU INSANE?

DO find a place that will keep the bubbly coming for a reasonable price.  I love Overland Cafe in Los Angeles because it's only $4.99 on top of your meal!
DON'T be picky about the quality of champagne.  No big.  You're going to have a headache in the end anyway.

DO maintain composure while waiting in the bathroom line after 4 cups of mimosas.  Pacing or dancing is welcomed, but hopefully you are the only one in line.
DON'T get locked out of your house when you have had 8 cups of mimosas.  Drunken landlord conversations are not fun, especially when you can't stop moving because you have to pee so bad.

DO take public transportation or walk!  Preferably take the bus to the beach after.
DON'T have a designated driver lock his keys in the car.  Also don't pass out on the lawn while waiting for AAA to come get the keys out.

DO have great conversations and play games with your friends when you have a two hour time slot to drink.
DON'T try to race someone who can easily drink you under the table.  You will win, but the end result may not be worth it. But still, winning does feel good.

DO Host your own!  Potluck brunch and homemade mimosas are highly encouraged.  Make quiche!
DON'T say no to life!  Don't stay home because you want to get things done on a Sunday.  Champagne brunch is great, but the company is even better!

Easy as Pie

I have friends that don't know idioms.  Or maybe they don't know western idioms.  They are both Taiwanese and grew up in Asian households. One night there was a competition between the two of them.  An "Idiom Off" so to say.  One of them would take a turn and say, "The grass is greener on the other side!" and the next would reply "Better safe than sorry!". Probably after 5 comical and struggling rounds of this, it soon became me whispering into my friend's ear and another more "westernly cultured" friend whispering into the competitor's ear.  After a few more rounds I leaned over and whispered, "Easy as pie" only to be met by a harsh face of doubt and hesitation to say it out loud.  "That's NOT one!"... "Haha hey everyone, Kalen says, 'Easy as pie' ppfffftt!" ....then everyone else responded yelling "THAT IS ONE!!!!"

Easy as pie.  Apparently the easy is referring to the eating of the pie, and not the making.  It makes sense.  Pie is easy to eat.  I don't think you meet a lot of people that don't like pie.  When someone doesn't like cake, they definitely like pie.  When someone isn't that into sweets, they still like fruit pies.  Pie is inherent in our nature  (Go with it).  Who says no to eating pie? 

Turns out, I love making pie.  I know pie crust can be woeful, but I can now make a good pie crust in a jiffy.  I've figured out I really enjoy cutting cold butter into flour.   It's therapeutic.  Cheesy, I know.  But really, pie can be easy to make and eat.  It just crust, rolling, fruit, sugar and spice, a thickener, some butter, more rolling, and pinching. Easy as pie! 

 

Baking in my mom's kitchen is so nice.  Everything is open and organized and fancy as compared to my tiny apartment kitchen.  When I was home we BBQed some steaks, had some caipirinhas, and had an impromptu game night with some old friends.  We had bought rhubarb the day before because I had never baked with it and was curious.  So before we sat down to games, I threw a strawberry rhubarb pie together and popped it in the oven.


The pie was easy!  I swear!  It was also really easy to eat it.  Almost too easy because we couldn't even wait until it was cool enough to slice it.  The tartness of the rhubarb was complemented perfectly by the sweet farmer's market strawberries.  Because of the heat, it hadn't thickened all the way, but it was still delicious.  Go figure, pie is awesome in every form.

Summer Bucket List

It's been awhile since I've posted.  Things have happened.  I've been busy trying to get started on the BEST SUMMER EVER.  It's silly, but my friends and I have all decided this is THE one.  That is, until next year.

Summer starts tomorrow, June 20, I know.  But in Los Angeles it feels like it has been here for weeks.  I remember being a kid and in May, everything changed.  More things were going on after school, more slurpee runs happened, and the air was charged with the excitement of the fun to come.  I'm pretty sure this still happened this year.  From January to April, all of my friends and I had crazy schedules and we weren't seeing each other as much.  But all of the sudden, come May, we're going to happy hours on Monday nights that spontaneously last until 1 AM.  We are having beach days and potluck brunches.

I'm not sure if it's us getting older, or us starting to get afraid that we all won't be in the same place for long, but we keep talking about making this the BEST SUMMER EVER.  I'm not following the calendar, so I'm going to make this summer go from April to October.  That's basically how it feels anyway right?

Let's talk about things that have happened or that are on my bucket list for this summer.

Bake Sale!  It was a success!  I made frosted sugar cookies, black bottom cupcakes, red velvet cakes in mason jars, and mini apple pies. It was stressful, but I had help from my sister, her friends, and our friends: gin and tonic.

 

GRILLED CHEESE FEST.  It was my third attendance.  Every time I love it.  Every time I leave thinking why I ate so many grilled cheese samples.  Glorious all in all. 

I want a lot of this to happen this summer.  Every time I have one of these bags of spicy juicy fruit in my lap, I feel like swinging my feet around and doing dances with my hands.  I LOVE spicy mango and pineapple.  They are a sign that summer is HERE.

I've been infusing alcohol.  It started with cucumber vodka and grapefruit vodka.  Of the vodkas I've done, they are probably my favorite.  I made jalapeno tequila.  Mind blow.  See below.  I also want to try pineapple rum and to start dabbling in bourbon and whiskey.  Found: one vanilla cardamom infused bourbon recipe here.

I want to drink as many spicy cocktails as I humanly can.  I've been obsessed with chile infused drinks and my friend and I have been ordering them wherever we go.  I took a stab at it on cinco de mayo with a blood orange jalapeno margarita.  I think the best one I've had so far is at the Corner Door.  Their Miner Incident: bourbon, honey, apricot, lemon, and Thai chiles is bonkers.  Don't eat the chile garnish though.  I am a beast with spicy stuff, and I was coughing and suffering because I thought I could do it.  The shame!

More popsicles. Whole fruit ones.  Coconut chunks.  I think yes.

I want more beer floats to happen.  Ice cream and beer.  Enough said.

Spontaneous lazy board game Sundays are always welcome.  Mostly I just like hanging out with friends in my pajamas.  Quirkle, Bananagrams, Spoons, and Uno are added bonuses.

More things that are on my bucket list this summer? Reading. Excessive amounts of sundresses. French-bulldog sitting? (i need to make friends with someone who has a frenchie that goes out of town all the time!) Picnics. Palm Springs. Night bowling. And keeping up with this dang blog!

Happy Summer!

Food Blogger Bake Sale!!!!

What are you doing this weekend? 
Personally, this weekend is set out to be pretty epic for me. Let's talk details.

1. I'm going to the Girlled Cheese Festival. You heard it!  It exists and I am going and eating as many cheese and carb conglomerations as I can.

2.  I'm going to a birthday party where at the same party last year someone I did not know who was wearing a metallic blazer bought everyone at the party 3 rounds of shots.  Needless to say, I'm a little nervous.

3.  At 8 AM the day after said Cheese Fest and said party I am running a 5K.  This could be dangerous and painful. 

4.  Most Importantly!  I am going to and participating in the Los Angeles Food Blogger Bake Sale!!!!
Come join me on Saturday, April 28th from 11:30AM to 2:00PM at BLD Restaurant (7450 Beverly Boulevard Los Angeles, CA 90036) to support Share Our Strength’s Great American Bake Sale for the No Kid Hungry Campaign.
Everything is donation based and there are a lot of talented bakers that will be attending, so you will be able to score some awesome goodies!  It is a fun event for a good cause so come join us!


and yes, that means I'm running a 5K after copious baked goods and grilled cheese, and with a possible hangover.  We'll see how this goes.  Overall, I'm excited! 

  

Three Veggie Servings

Life is about balance.  At least that is what my mom tells me.  I think it's open to interpretation.  When applied to food, balance I guess is having salad every once in a while.  Maybe after you have cake for breakfast.  This week I had oatmeal for breakfast.  But then last minute, I put nutella in it.  Balance!

Although my mom tells me to find balance in my life, she usually isn't referring to food.  Or if she is, she didn't do a good job instilling good values in me at a young age.  When my sister and I were little, my mom was unconventional in her breakfast ways.  Some days would be by the book, cereal and OJ.  But most days we would have whatever my mom felt like making us.  Ham and Cheese Omelette?  Okay.  Grilled Cheese?  Wavering.  Brownie Sundaes?  A teacher's worst nightmare.  In first grade when we were learning the food pyramid, Mrs. Hackett went around asking us what we had for breakfast.  When she asked me, I responded truthfully and innocently not knowing my mother's indecency, "Apple pie a la mode".  It happened.  I think about it now, and my mom was mischievous!  Filling us with sugar and then sending us off to school for our teachers to deal with!  Overall awesome for me, but probably not Mrs. Hackett.

Even though my mom may have trained us to crave brownies in the AM, sometimes after way too many baked goods, I only wanna eat kale salads with dried cranberries in them.  I make smoothies and put some leafy greens in them and try to feel better about the strawberry shortcake I ate the night before.  I eat only roasted brussels sprouts for dinner (this happens all the time because I love them so).  The trouble is, sometimes healthy things we should be eating, aren't as delicious as the bagels or strawberry cupcakes we would rather be having.

That's where balance comes in!  After I've had one too many salads, I've taken to finding largely vegetable based meals or recipes, that have some element of deliciousness. Some of my favorites lately: Zucchini Potato Pancakes, Green Bean Fries, and a Cheesy Asparagus Tart.  I feel like if my meal is mostly vegetables I don't feel as bad, even if there is puff pastry involved.  All are extremely delicious!  The green beans are for real healthy, and the other two aren't bad.  See the recipes below and start cooking!

Peanut Butter Bundt Cake

 

I've acquired a bundt.  It has been my dream for a few months, but haven't actually taken the time to go buy one.  Lucky for me, my friend's mom gave me her extra bundt pan!

I've googled some history of the bundt.  Not only do they make a beautiful cake, there is a method to their madness.  The bundt was formed so that it could cook a denser cake batter.  The hole in the middle allows heat to penetrate heavy cake batters from all sides.  Smart!  Supposedly, the word bundt comes from the German word "bund" which means a gathering of people, or a bond.  The t was added for good form, and to trademark the dish.

This history is fitting for my first bundt.  Hannah and I made it together in Baltimore.  Hannah's and my bond of friendship is pretty grade A in my book.  We roughed it up in Africa and spent almost every day together for 4 months in a village where no one speaks your language, you do your bathroom business in a hole in the ground, and you have no water or electricity.  You try to spend 24/7 with a stranger in the village and not get sick of them! For Hannah and I, and most of our program luckily, it worked.  The bond between us was clearly pretty strong.  You know when people say that stronger relationships form after extreme situations?  Try 4 months of extreme.

One way we've kept it up is with our love for food and baking, as stated before.  Hannah and I send each other drool worthy recipes daily.  We oo and aaahh over tastespotting.  We talk about our woes of our lackluster healthy lunches and not having daily sweet treats in the office. We link each other to joythebaker.com and wish that she was our friend! We both were anxiously waiting her cookbook's debut and bought it within the first week!

Since my Baltimore trip was coming up, we decided it would be fitting to bake one of Joy's recipes.  It happened.  It was glorious.  It was Joy's Peanut Butter Birthday Cake with Peanut Butter Cream Cheese Frosting. Peanut Butter + Cream Cheese.  How great of a bond is that?  Go make it.  Now.  I'm not even one of those crazy peanut butter people and this cake is obsess-worthy.

Bundts are inviting. Their ring form and pretty edges are for sharing.  With this peanut butter cake, everyone will want to be your friend. You'll create bonds with all the neighbors.  Remember that bond that arises from sharing extreme experiences?  Get ready for it. It's gonna happen. This cake is for real!

A Baltimore Food Tour

When you read Baltimore, did you immediately think of Channing Tatum in Step Up?  If your answer is even 50% yes, then we should be friends. I went to Baltimore this month, and when I told people I was going to Baltimore, no one really understood why.  Well what they don't understand, is that Baltimore is actually a little gem of a city.  This was my second time to Baltimore, and while I realize parts are dangerous, in what I saw, Baltimore is a big city with a small town feel.  It's where you stop on walks and talk to strangers about their rescue dog.  It's where they know your order at the coffee shop.  It's where all the houses are beautiful because they are big, old, and wooden with front porches to drink lemonade on. 

I went to Baltimore to visit my friend Hannah, who may very well affect my total view of Charm City because she and her family are those kind people who smile at strangers and will invite you over for lemonade.  But anyway, both times I've been in Baltimore, I have thoroughly enjoyed it. 

Once upon a time, Hannah and I lived in Tanzania together.  We taught a rural village about HIV prevention.  Teaching and living there was bonkers great, but the lifestyle of Tanzania 1) has a lot of down time and 2) does not have dairy products.  While food was the least of our worries while we were there, Hannah and I found common ground in talking about all the food we would eat when we got back home.  We talked about meatloaf and macaroni and cheese and found that we shared a love of Martha Stewart's mac! We discussed Trader Joe's peanut butter cups, how much cheese we'd be eating when we got home, even if it made us sick, and chocolate ganache milkshakes.  While torturous, it was so fun.  Our eating talk, and our friendship have continued into present day. So this Baltimore trip was largely about food.  We went to various eateries and we baked of course!

Let's re-live!

The chocolate ganache milkshakes?  Those are at Good Stuff Eatery in DC.  We found our dreams of ganache ended up being more of a hot fudge milkshake.  But in pursuit of this milkshake, we tried the ultimate winner: a toasted marshmallow milkshake.  Literally, campfire in your mouth!   Our homegirl (we pretend) Joy the Baker has a recipe!  We also ate our fair share in burgers and french fries.  Hannah's had a fried egg on it, how can you go wrong with that? I got the Obama Burger: onion marmalade, bacon, and horseradish mayo.  What up Obama!  I'm glad we are both swayed by the word "horseradish" on a menu!  By the time we got to Good Stuff, we were so hungry that we ordered enough to feed at least two more people.  Hannah is afraid for what we will be feeling 30 minutes from this picture.  Rightfully so.

 

We made Momofuku's corn cookies from the box.  It's like cornbread in cookie form.  I have to say, we both thought they were a bit strange and that they needed something.  I want to try their compost cookies next!

Meet Huck.  He is 5 months old and Hannah's new best friend!  I have selflessly volunteered myself as the far away aunt that spoils him.  I painted him a dog dish.  He liked biting my hands and stealing my socks from deep in my luggage.

 Pretty tomatoes at Belvedere Market!

This one frequented talks in Tanzania.  It is the Hannah made infamous Neopol's Smoked Salmon BLT on Sunflower Flax bread.  While Hannah does talk things up, this one took the cake.  Delicious.  You know how after you eat a sandwich and the roof of your mouth is all torn up?  I secretly love that, as long as the sandwich was worth it.  In this case, this one definitely is.  Smoked Salmon, Apple-wood Smoked Bacon, the L and T, some added red onion, and some dilly dijon mustard.  Try to tell me you aren't drooling!

Mojitos and conversations at the top of the American Visionary Arts Museum.  I had no idea this museum existed and I really loved it.  Beautiful.

I've talked this meal up over the last couple years.  Hannah took me to Donna's the first time I came to Baltimore and I have been thinking about this meal since.  Grilled Romaine Steak Salad and Truffle Mac and Cheese.  The truffle mac I think is the best I've had.  I dream about truffles.  This mac and cheese is mature and luxurious.  It's rich and fancy.  If it were a person it would lounge on velvet couches and wear emeralds.  But let's not overlook the Grilled Romaine.  Grilling Romaine!  What an idea.  I love it.  It wilts the leaves to a point, but gives them a charred taste and still keeps the crunch from the veins and the heart of the leaf.  On top of that, throw on some sweet caramelized onions, ripe tomatoes, juicy steak, and goat cheese.  I literally have said before that it could be a contender for my Last Supper.  It is definitely in the running.

Baltimore is a place where at brunch they give you complimentary warm cinnamon rolls.  That sounds like dreamland doesn't it?  Sunday morning brunch we shared french toast and a Baltimore Crab Benedict! We had to get crab in the trip at some point, but didn't make it back to Faidley's for the famous crabcakes.

 We then had a baking adventure and made Joy the Baker's Peanut Butter Cake in bundt form (post to come soon).  Bundts are my new fave, and Hannah's mom gave me her spare as a handmedown! Thanks Jane!

Our last lunch we went back to Belvedere Market to Neopols and got smoked Cubanos, shared some bacon brussels sprouts, and enjoyed a refreshing cinnamon, ginger, and cardamom lemonade.  That one I need to figure out how to make for spring time because I finished mine and drank most of Hannah's sister's lemonade too!

Baltimore, Hannah, and family, thanks for the eats!  I'm already excited for my next visit and more food adventures!